WhatsApp alert: they use states to know the exact location of any contact

There is no insoluble software and everyone, even the most advanced, is prone to errors. The turn is at this time for WhatsApp: a bug has been discovered in the status section that allows know the location of any user.

And while there are many tricks to getting the exact position where a particular contact is on the list, a hole in the states lets you know exactly where is the person you want to follow.

This way, what should be an entertaining way to temporarily share curiosities with friends can be a threat if used with bad intentions.

The states came to WhatsApp, which was inspired by Instagram Stories, a social network of the same company and even though they are not one of the most popular functions within the messenger, they hide a trap for the curious.

Statuses can be videos and photos with elements such as text or links shared via the user’s profile photo. They have an expiration date of 24 hours and can each adjust which contacts they allow access to that publication.

The problem is when someone, out of curiosity or boredom, decides to view the content of someone who has intentionally added tracking links using MySQL tables for those who come to see it.

So, after sharing a fraudulent state, the owner then receive a report including all contacts who visited it and clicked on the link. In addition to the exact time of that interaction and the person’s namesomething Instagram doesn’t do.

The hacker can find out where that person is at that exact moment. This may seem like a very complicated resource for anyone to implement, but it is definitely a possibility that should be considered when using this WhatsApp feature.

Other ways to spy

When the connection is made to establish WhatsApp video calls, communication with the recipient’s IP is activated and that is when the confidential information is released.

An attacker’s access to the public IP of WhatsApp users also indicates that he may be captured control over their movements, that is, it will have the possibility to track its location because it will have access to the history of that location.

But the most serious thing is that having knowledge of users ’IPs can lead to computer attacks – whether it’s mobile or desktop – if the criminal takes advantage of the vulnerability.

Tips

To prevent fraud and fraud, WhatsApp provides several security solutions to narrow the risk gap.

• Choose who can see the privacy statuses: as its name suggests, it allows you to choose which people can see what is uploaded in the statuses.
• Most threats come through fraudulent links and malicious files. We must be careful with these messages and not trust everything we receive, even if it comes from a trusted contact.
• The advantage of WhatsApp Web is that the account can be used in any browser, but the problem is that anyone can access it later, whether they are using a public computer or someone else.
• Turn on 2-Step Verification and provide an email address in case you forget your PIN.
• Never share your 2-Step Verification PIN or registration code with others.
• Be careful who has physical access to the phone. If someone physically accesses, they can use the WhatsApp account without permission.

SL